


the old adam(ites)

by greased_lightning_rod



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Character Study, Gardening metaphors, M/M, Pining, Subtext
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-08
Updated: 2019-06-08
Packaged: 2020-04-12 12:54:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19132429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greased_lightning_rod/pseuds/greased_lightning_rod
Summary: The thing of it is, angels love very broadly. Anyone who knows Aziraphale[1] can see this. He loves fine weather and fine art, fine foods and fine wine, books and ducks and humanity as a whole. All creatures great and small, et cetera. He’s an angel. They’re built that way.Crowley, though. Crowley has lived in the world as long as Aziraphale, but he’s a demon. And demons can love, he’s learned, but it’s—complicated. It isn’t quite natural; it takes effort, time. Crowley is fairly sure he’s the only demon who’s managed it at all[2], and he’s only managed it four measly times.





	the old adam(ites)

**Author's Note:**

> With apologies for the meditative nature of this beast, and also for the ending.
> 
> Title refers to the Adamites, apparently a heretical sect that believed in "a form of spirituality immune from sin even in the flesh and imbued the concept of lust with a paradisical innocence[1]", and which it is believed by some that Heironymous Bosch was a member, because "The Garden of Earthly Delights" was frankly a bit long and on the nose.
> 
> [1] Yeah, I quoted Wikipedia.

The thing of it is, angels love very broadly. Anyone who knows Aziraphale[1] can see this. He loves fine weather and fine art, fine foods and fine wine, books and ducks and humanity as a whole. All creatures great and small, et cetera. He’s an angel. They’re built that way. 

Crowley, though. Crowley has lived in the world as long as Aziraphale, but he’s a demon. And demons _can_ love, he’s learned, but it’s—complicated. It isn’t quite natural; it takes effort, time. Crowley is fairly sure he’s the only demon who’s managed it at all[2], and he’s only managed it four measly times. 

In honesty[3], it’s a bit like gardening. Demons make an inhospitable environment for affection, never mind something so profane as love. But every so often a perfectly normal seed, lust or avarice or gluttony or what have you, made its way into just the wrong crack in a demon’s shriveled black heart, and put down roots. And then sometimes it happened that that perfectly harmful seed grew into something like _affection_ , and if you weren’t diligent in your gardening, if you didn’t reach deep and pull it out, it could just—keep _growing_ , and changing, until there it was, you had a deep and abiding appreciation for Queen and nothing to be done about it, and anyway why would you want to?

It happened that way with the Bentley, this initial attraction to speed and prestige and capitalist excess that had mutated into something perverse. And with alcohol too, something so apparently tangled up with gluttony and sloth Crowley ought to have been _fine_ , ought to have been laughing all the way to Hell. Alcohol made people miserable, made them angry, made them fight, made them fuck. Affection for alcohol ought to have been safe, except he found himself hoarding the best bottles to—to _share_. And not because he wanted to make someone miserable, or angry, or argumentative. Not even, he’ll admit[4], because he wants to fuck[5].

No, he keeps the best bottles to share because the very first insidious seed to take root in Crowley’s soul was Aziraphale’s, some six thousand years ago, and no matter how much Crowley might shout at it, it simply keeps growing, branching out. And plants, however well they do under Crowley’s threats, still need sustenance. Water. Wine. It’s all the same, really, with the liberal application of a miracle here or there. The thing—the _love_ , if you have to use the word—is part of Crowley now. He isn’t going to let it _die_.

The thing of it is, Aziraphale loves so broadly. He’s made that way. His love spreads across the world like clover in a lawn—lush and green and, and _wholesome_ , but… shallow. Only a small part of that clover is for Crowley, which is still more than he deserves[6].

And the thing of it is, Crowley loves so seldom. His love is a white cedar that’s clawed its way into the rock of his heart over decades, centuries, _millennia_ , twisted in the harsh wind.

It isn’t the same thing, and there’s no use pretending it is. He’s not going to say anything about it.

Not so Aziraphale will understand, at least.

“Angel!” he says brightly, bursting through the door to the shop. Aziraphale looks up from—from, good Dark Lord, _The Power of Movement in Plants_ , of all things. For a moment Crowley feels hunted, but no. It must be coincidence. Even if he does itch to look around for anything Anathema might have forgotten to burn. He holds up the bottle instead. “I brought your favorite.”

A long second ticks by, and something flickers in Aziraphale’s eyes before settling in the gentleness of his smile. “Well, my dear,” he says primly, closing the book. “So you have.”

 

[1] Crowley.

[2] And honestly he oughtn’t use that word, _manage_ , like this is some sort of accomplishment and not a horrifying cosmic accident.

[3] Crowley doesn’t enjoy honesty as a rule—it sits uncomfortably on him—but if pressed he’ll admit there are times it’s a dead useful necessary good.

[4] If he must.

[5] Though, well, he may.

[6] If far less than he desires.


End file.
